 Well, today, tonight, we're going to look at Jeremiah chapter 29, Jeremiah chapter 29. So we're going to take a couple of stops before we get there, and we're going to look at the title of the message is Thriving in Babylon, Thriving in Babylon. Now by way of introduction, in the late 70s, I don't know how many of you remember an author by the name of Dr. Francis Schaefer. You remember Dr. Francis Schaefer? That's all of us old people. All right, he's a guy you should really look up if you don't know who he is. He wrote a book entitled, How Should We Then Live? How Should We Then Live? And it was eventually made into a documentary, but the idea behind this book is that it traced Western history from ancient Rome until the late 60s, early 70s when this book was written. And the central premise of the book is that when we base society on the Bible, when we base society on the infinite personal God who is here, who is there and has spoken, that this provides an absolute by which we can conduct our lives. It's an absolute truth. It's an absolute basis of society. But when we base society on humanism, which Dr. Schaefer defined as a value system rooted in the belief that man is his own measure, that we determine what is right and wrong, that man is autonomous, totally independent, and that all values are relative and that we have no way to distinguish right from wrong except for utilitarianism, which says that if it works and it's useful and it doesn't hurt anybody, then it's right. And so this is where we get this whole idea that, well, that's true for you, but that's not true for me. We've actually told people that, right? It's like, well, that's your experience, but that's not my experience. So that really isn't true. That's not what we would call true because we all have different experiences. Thus man's experience becomes the basis for man's belief instead of God's character and his word. And so when that happens, you know, as long as I'm preaching my experience, then we have a basis of disagreement because I can always say that that's not my experience. You know, you can say, well, God is a God of love. Well, I didn't, I don't, I didn't experience that. God hates me. Why? Because I'm gay. So God hates me. You know, and that's the belief. And because there is no standard, this leads to a fragmentation of thought. In other words, you know, you're kind of in your world and I'm kind of in my world. And so what do we do? We try to build community based on people that think like we do, that agree with our basic approach to life. And so we have this fragmentation of thought and this fragmentation of thought leads to alienation where we're alone now. We're separated from people because I can't hang out with you because I don't agree with you. You know, I don't like you. I don't agree with you. I don't dress like you. And so now I'm alienated from you. And that alienation of man from each other leads to despair in society. And that's what we have today. An ultimate hopelessness. My son who's in his 20s will often talk to me about how he as someone in their mid-20s is looking at America today and the decisions that are being made by the government and different things. And his future view is one of despair. He doesn't see a great deal of hope because he's looking at the fact that they've got this incredible deficit that now he's going to have to pay back. And he's like, I didn't even want it. You know, I didn't even get my bailout money. And so he looks at this hopelessness in society when he looks at it apart from Christ. And so Dr. Schaefer asked the question, how should we then live in such a society? How do we live in the society that we have today that is fragmented from God, that where the Word of God is no longer the standard? How are we supposed to live in a society like that? And in our text tonight, we're going to find Judah, the southern kingdom of Judah, about to be led into captivity into Babylon. And Jeremiah is giving them instruction on how to live in Babylon. Now to give you a little bit of background on what is happening in this story in chapter 29 of Jeremiah, Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, was originally from a city called Ur. Now Ur was in where? Babylon. So he came from Babylon. Abraham was originally from Ur, which was located in Babylon. And it was also known as a sacred city. So it was a city of worship. It was known for the worship of the moon god. So it's very possible that Abraham's dad, which we know from Scripture was an idolater, that he probably worshiped the moon god and his uncles and aunts and they were moonies. No, I'm just kidding. But they worshiped the moon god. Now what's interesting is if you look at the symbol of the moon god, it's a crescent moon with a star. OK, if you watch the news, you'll start connecting the dots. A crescent moon with a star. You could write Isis over it. So this moon god has been around for a long time, you know. Now in Genesis 12, God calls Abraham out of Ur, right? You know the story. He calls Abraham out of Ur and Abraham leaves his father's house to go find a city whose builder and maker is God. And God says, I'm going to show you a land. I'm going to take you to a land that I'm going to give to you. And so Abraham leaves Babylon and the Lord appears to Abraham and he makes a covenant with him in Genesis 17. And I'm just going to read it for you in verses seven and eight of Genesis 17. It says, and I will establish my covenant between me and you and your descendants after you and their generations for an everlasting covenant to be God to you and your descendants after you. Also, I give to you and your descendants after you the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession. And I will be their God. This is the covenant that God makes with Abraham. So God says, I will give you all the land of Canaan to you and your descendants as an everlasting possession and I will be their God. That's why when we see all the land disputes that are happening in Israel right now and everybody's saying, well, it's my land. This land is my land. No, this, you know, no, this land is my land and you have the Palestinians saying, no, this is our land and who owns all the land? God, the Bible says the earth is the Lord's and all that's in it. So if there's someone that has a right to assign the land, who is it? God. And what does God say? I'm giving the land to the nation of Israel. I'm giving the land to the descendants of Abraham. So from the biblical perspective, God, who has the right to give the land, has given the land to the Jews and it belongs to them. And it's an everlasting possession and he says, I will be their God. Now with every generation that comes up after Abraham with Isaac and Jacob and even further on, God renews this covenant. So he goes to Isaac and says, I told Abraham this, I'm telling you this. You know, I'm giving you the land. I'm going to be your God. You're going to be my people. And so he keeps passing it on from generation to generation until we come to Moses and with Moses, God makes an extended covenant which is called the Mosaic Covenant. And one of the conditions of the Mosaic Covenant that he makes with Moses is that they were not to worship any other gods. That they were not to worship any false gods. And we read about this in Exodus chapter 20 verses three through six. It's God's top 10. And he says here, you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that it is the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them nor serve them for I the Lord, I am your God, I am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandment. And so God says that there will be consequences if you worship other gods. And one of those consequences of worshiping and serving other gods is that they will be taken out of the land. So God tells them up front. If you worship other gods, I'm going to take you out of the land. But it's interesting because he says this as well as part of the covenant. And when I take you out of the land, you're going to experience my wrath, my fury, and my anger. That's what he tells them, he tells them up front. So when people think, oh, the God of the Bible is such a mean God. You know, it's like, why is he so angry with these poor people? They're just trying to follow him. You know, I don't know if anybody ever tried to follow God through the desert, but it's hard. And then he gets mad at them because they don't follow him really well. Well, God made it very clear in the covenant. It was part of the covenant. So later on, when he says, you're going to experience my wrath and my fury, he had already told them that as part of the covenant. It was one of the conditions. If you break the covenant, this is what you're going to happen. And so it was very compassionate that God was telling them up front. The consequences so that they can make a good decision. Now here we are in Jeremiah 26 and or Jeremiah 29. Judah has ignored God's top 10. And now God is taking them out of the land. You know, he's taking them out of the land just like he told them. If you worship other idols, I'm going to take you out of the land. And guess where he's taking them to? He's taking them all the way back to Babylon. All the way back to where he found them when he first sought after them. All the way back to their roots, to where Abraham was. That's where he takes them back to all the way back to Babylon. And it's in essence what he's saying by doing this is, look, if you don't want me, if you don't want me to be your God, that's OK. I love you. I don't want to force you to love me. That's not love, is it? If God has to force you to love him. But if you want to serve those other gods, then let me take you back to where I found you. We'll go all the way back to Babylon where I found you to begin with. And you can hang out with those gods all you want. They can take care of you. You can have fun with them. You know, just go for it. If that's really what you want and that's what you've chosen, then we'll just take you all the way back to there. And that's essentially what God is doing. You know, it's a heavy thing. God says that you don't want me to be your God, then I'll take you back to where I found you and see how you like that, serving the gods of Babylon. Now, here's the thing about God, though. If that was where the story ended, we would probably say, well, they got what they got coming to them, right? They got what they deserve. Wouldn't you say that? Wouldn't that be an agreement? You break the covenant, you get what you deserve, right? And so if the story would have ended there, God would have been justified to judge them for their idolatry, for their sin. But God doesn't stop there. In fact, it's not the end of the story for God at all. God says to them in Jeremiah 31.3, he says, the Lord has appeared to me of old saying, yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness, I have drawn you. And so God comes to Judah and he tells them, listen, you're gonna be taken into captivity. You've chosen idolatry and it's the consequences for breaking our covenant. But listen, I love you. And I desire you, I don't want you to go into captivity. And it's my desire to bless you. That's really what I want. So in the midst of your captivity, I'm gonna tell you how to live so that you'll not just survive while you're in captivity, but you'll thrive. You'll not just survive while you're in captivity, but you'll thrive. And here's the tie-in for you and I today. You know, Paul describes this world as being controlled by this present evil age. And just like Judah was taken into captivity to Babylon, this world is in captivity to this present evil age. But Paul tells us in Galatians 1-3-5, grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ who gave himself for our sins that he might deliver us from this present evil age according to the will of our God and Father to whom be glory forever and ever, amen. And so Jesus died on the cross to deliver you and I from this present evil age. And so although in a sense we're living in Babylon, God doesn't want us to simply survive in this world. He wants us to thrive as we're living as pilgrims and strangers here in this land. This is not our final destination. And let me take it a step further. Maybe you're like Judah tonight. Maybe you're one who is suffering the consequences of bad decisions that you've made in your life. You know, maybe you've made decisions and you've got what you've got coming to you. But God says to you tonight, there's hope. There's hope because I wanna show you how to live a life of abundance to thrive even in the midst of failure. I wanna show you what I wanna do in your life. So listen to what God instructs them to do in Jeremiah 29. We're gonna look at verse four. He says this, thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all who were carried away captive whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon, build houses and dwell in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit, take wives and beget sons and daughters and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands so that they may bear sons and daughters, that you may be increased there and not diminished and seek the peace of the city where I've caused you to be carried away captive and pray to the Lord for it, for in its peace you will have peace, for thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, do not let your prophets and your diviners who are in your midst deceive you nor listen to your dreams which caused you to be dreamed, for they prophesy falsely to you in my name and I have not sent them, says the Lord. That's what he tells them to do. Now I want you to understand what's going on. They've messed up. They messed up big time. Judah has messed up and because they messed up they're going in exile. But going into exile wasn't the end of existence for them as the people of God. You understand that? That even though they were going into exile it wasn't the end of their relationship with God. It wasn't the end of their existence as the people of God. God doesn't say it's over, I'm done with you. You're going to Babylon. Good riddance, I'll see you in a few years. He doesn't do that. But God says it's a new beginning. It's a new phase of relating to you and us relating together as the people of God. You know the Bible says that God makes all things work together for good to those who love God to those who are called according to his purpose. And that's a verse that gets thrown around a lot and so much so that we've almost lost the impact of what that verse really means. But what God is saying is even though you're in Babylon it doesn't mean that I still don't have a purpose for you while you're there. It doesn't mean that my purposes are not working in your life even while you are in Babylon. They were still God's people and they were still called according to his purpose. And you might be going through one of the hardest times of your life but you are still God's son. You are still his daughter. You are still his person. Still called according to his purpose that he has purpose for your life. And what is that purpose? What is that purpose that we learned in Jeremiah 31? I've loved you with an everlasting love and I want to draw you to myself with my loving kindness. That's God's purpose. He wants to show you how much he loves you. And even in the midst of your failure he can show you his love in a new way to show his everlasting love. And so in the midst of captivity God says to Judah I'm gonna instruct you on how to thrive, not just survive. And he points to four areas of life that really matter and we're gonna look at those now. And I believe these four areas of life apply to us today. First of all he says here in verse five, build houses and dwell in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit. He says you are to build houses and live in them. Now why would he tell them that? Why would he tell this to the nation of Judah while they're in captivity to do this? Well first of all, they've lost everything. They left everything behind in Judah. They lost their businesses, they lost their homes, they probably lost some of their loved ones as they're making the trip from Jerusalem into Babylon. You know they've lost a great deal. And so in a sense God is saying to them when you get there, when you get into Babylon don't just sit there and feel sorry for yourself. Just don't sit there and wallow in self pity, get back to building life. Get back to living life. Get back to what I've made you for. You know in our culture today, and I remember back in the 70s there were people that, they got tired of how hard it was in the world and they heard Jesus was coming soon. So they sold everything and they liquidated all their assets, they got on the roofs and they waited for the rapture to come. Some of them are still there. You can see them on Google, they're on their roofs just waiting for the rapture to come, you know? And they just got tired of living in this world. And there's some times when I've talked to believers and they're just tired of living in this world. Maybe you can relate to that. Like oh Jesus just needs to come back soon before another election. Please, it's like I can't take it anymore, you know? But he's saying, he's saying to them, don't just sit there and do nothing. Don't just sit there and wait for me to bring you back into the land. I want you to be productive where you are. Build houses, build a life, you know? Plant gardens, get lots of food, get busy and live. You know there's no place for self pity in the kingdom of God. And really self pity, if you understand it, is just another form of pride. It's just another form of pride. Because you're just blaming everybody else and not taking responsibility. You're blaming the world for your problems, but you're not looking at yourself. You're just having pity on yourself. It's another form of pride. And the reality is there is truth. We are pilgrims in this world. The Bible calls us aliens and strangers. Some of us are more strange than others. Some of us are illegal aliens. That's gonna change soon. And the reality is, is that our true home is with the Lord, isn't it? Our true home is with the Lord. But Jesus told us in Luke 19 to do business until he returns. And so while we're waiting for the Lord to return, we should be making plans. Building houses, buying houses, building businesses, being an influence in the cities and the neighborhoods and the companies that God places us in. That God placed you there because you're his missionary into that area that you are. You know, God just didn't give you a job. He gave you a mission field. You know, you're not just a student on a campus. You're a missionary to that lost tribe, if you will. And God has placed you there. And he wants us to influence the places where we are. You know, in the neighborhood that you're at, you know, you should be so dialed in to your neighbors, so plugged into their lives that if you were to leave the neighborhood, they would be sad, not glad when you left. You know? Now there's some neighbors we're glad when they leave. There's some people at our jobs, we're glad when they go. You know, we're happy that they're not there anymore. Don't let it be you. Because that's not what God has for you. God wants you to make a difference where you are. That's why he places you there, to be an influence. The second thing he says is that you are to get married, have kids and have grandkids. In verse six here, it says, take wives and beget sons and daughters and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands so that they may bear sons and daughters that you may be increased there and not diminished. And so I did this in my church. I just want to have all the single people stand. No, I'm just kidding. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. It'd be a great time to do that. Now, on the surface, right? On the surface, this sounds like God is saying, get married and have a bunch of kids. Right, that's kind of what it sounds like on the surface. But there really is a greater purpose here that he is getting at. Greater purpose in getting married and having babies. And it goes all the way back to Genesis chapter one in verse 27 through 28. It says, so God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him, male and female he created them. And then God blessed them and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves on the earth. And so the Bible says that God made man in his own image. Now, I want you to think about this for a second. In the Near East, one of the things that the kings would do, in order to let the people know that this was their territory is that they would build statues of themselves or little images of themselves and they would put it all over the borders of the kingdom. So as you're coming into the kingdom or into their realm, you would see an image of them and you would know that they were the king of that realm. As history or as cultures progressed, where did the image of the king end up on? Money, right? So they started putting their image on the money. So you could only trade in that king's kingdom with their image on the coin. And that was how you knew where you were at who ruled the realm, so to speak. So here's the thing, God has made man in his image. That means every person in this room, God has made in his image, you're made in the image of God. Everywhere you go in this world that you see the image of God, what does that tell you who is the king of that realm? God. It doesn't matter where you go in this world, whether you're in China or in Russia or Mongolia or India, they might be misguided in who their God is, but the reality of it is that all of us are made in the image of God. And so everywhere you go is a testimony of the fact that God is the king of this world. Amen? Amen. I think that's exciting. And some of these images have dots on their head. It's weird. So man is made in God's image and everywhere you see a person, you're reminded that God is the king of the realm. So when we have children, what are we doing? We're filling the world with what? More of God's image, right? We're increasing the image of God on the earth. And so the family was one of the primary vehicles that God uses to fill the earth and what? Subdu it, right? Fill the earth and subdue it. And here's the truth. When you depart from God's created intent for marriage and family, which is to extend the rule and reign of God on earth through godly families, when you divorce marriage from that, when you take marriage away from that created intent, then you open marriage up to what we're seeing in today's culture, which is a redefinition of what marriage actually is. Because they've taken marriage out of its original created intent, which God had created marriage for, you see. And we need to get back to that. As Christian men and women, we need to understand that the reason why God forms families is not just so that we have companionship in this world, but we are through our families to extend the kingdom of God by raising godly children. Amen? So he says here that we are to subdue. Now the word subdue literally means to bring under submission by strength. That were to bring the world under submission by strength. And so man wasn't to be ruled by creation. Man was to rule over creation. So by telling men to take wives and start families, God was telling Judah, God was telling the nation of Israel, that even though you are under captivity, you're not to be ruled by captivity, but you were to rule over captivity. You're to rule over captivity. And one of the ways that you rule over captivity is to increase, to fill the earth, to subdue by increasing your numbers, okay? So as you increase your numbers, you grow in what? Strength, because there is strength in numbers. Now there are certain populations that understand this, that they know this. And it's one of the realities, I have it posted on my blog, where with Muslim families, once they're below a certain percentage, they're the nicest people in the world. But when they get above a certain percentage of population, then they start demanding Sharia law. First they wanna form a temple, a place of worship. Once they get a place of worship, and they grow in numbers, then they wanna implement Sharia law. As they, after they implement Sharia law, and they begin to grow in numbers, then they begin to demand that Sharia law be implemented. Once they get implementation of Sharia law, and they grow in more numbers, then they begin to protest in the streets, and they begin to become violent, which is what we're seeing in Dearborn, Michigan today. And in places in Texas, in Minnesota. And they continue to get, grow in numbers to the point where they tell the police, hey, don't come around our neighbors anymore. We've got it covered. We'll handle our own policing. You're not allowed in here anymore. And then it will get to the point where Christians aren't allowed in there also. You see, they understand that strategy. And one of the reasons that the church is so weak is because we've rejected God's created intent for marriage and family. We've rejected that idea. And so divorce, adultery, workaholism, addiction, parents who live together without marriage, break down and fragment families. They cause families to be broken down. And where families are broken down, the kingdom of God is weakened through that family. It's what Francis Schaefer predicted would happen once men rejected the Bible as the absolute authority for families, for life. But as believers, we're to live differently. We're to live different lives. And of course, one of the ways that we see God's rule and reign extended is by leading people to Christ. And we begin to bring the gospel into people's lives. And as they come to Jesus, their lives are turned around. And so that's why I'm excited when I see families come to Christ and begin living life according to God's word. Because it changes their whole life around. We have that happening in our church and it's exciting to see. And so the family is so important. It's so important. Third, he says, you are to seek for and pray for the city or the peace of the city. Now I find it interesting because here, the nation of Judah is in captivity. But God says to them that I'm gonna make it your responsibility now to pray for the peace of the city that's nearest to you, the city that you're in. And he makes it their responsibility to pray for the peace of God to be in the cities where they live. And that word for peace is the word shalom. And shalom is an interesting word because we really don't have a English word that describes what shalom is. You know, the word can be described as peace, but it's much bigger than peace. It means wholeness or unity. It can include prosperity. It can include health, safety, harmony, fulfillment. It's the peace that comes from unimpaired relationships. So it's the peace that comes between people because there's nothing in the way causing those relationships to break down. It's the peace that comes upon a business and brings success to that business because the things that are ruining the profitability of that business aren't there because God is king. You know, it's the thing that brings peace into a society because the things that disintegrate societies and pull societies down aren't there because God is king. He's bringing his peace into that area of life. And so God is suggesting that while Judah is in Babylon that they have the ability to change the environment that they live in by bringing peace to it. They have the ability to change the atmosphere of the city. And as Christians, we have the ability to change the environment that we're in by bringing the peace of God with us everywhere we go. You see? And we can do that first and foremost by praying. By praying for peace to be everywhere that we are. Now, we just celebrated, or not celebrated, participated in our marriage prayer breakfast in San Clemente where we gathered together and we prayed for God's peace to be on our city. And it was an incredible thing. In May, I think it's seventh that's coming up, the National Day of Prayer, another time for churches all over to gather together and pray for the peace of God to be upon their cities. That's our responsibility as believers to pray for the peace of God to be in the neighborhoods that we are on because if the peace is on our city, the peace will be upon us as well. We'll be blessed by that. And so we're commanded by God to pray for Shalom, the peace of God in our cities that we're in and that by doing that we can actually change the spiritual dynamic of the place that we're in. Isn't that exciting to know that you could do that? Isn't that incredible to know that you can make that difference? Doesn't it make you wanna like check yourself next time you go into work and you got that person that really bothers you to be able to say, okay Lord, I'm gonna pray the peace of God on that person. And just pray for that person to see what God does. See what God will do if you'll commit it to pray. And so we begin by praying but we also begin by being the peace of God to people. The last thing he says is that you're to stop listening to false prophets, to diviners and dreamers because they deceive you. In Jeremiah's day when the false prophets were telling them that everything was okay but it wasn't okay. They said that you're going to Babylon but you'll only be there a couple of years but that wasn't what God said. God said that you'll be there for 70 years. So they were basically lying to the people and they told the people, they gave the people in a sense false hope. They gave them false hope because Jeremiah knew that they were going to be there for 70 years and if they didn't settle in and settle down and grow at the end of those 70 years there would be nothing left. And so the future of God's people depended on them obeying the command to be fruitful and multiply while they were in captivity, living in Babylon. Not to listen to the false hope of the false prophets. God says I didn't send them so don't even listen to them. Now here's the thing, we have false prophets today. We have false prophets in the church today that preach a different gospel. I've heard recently even in our city there's pastors that believe that Noah was a story, wasn't real, that the flood never really happened. They'll say all traditions have a flood story, never really happened. It's just a moral principle story that we're supposed to learn. That Jonah was just a story. It really wasn't a real event. There are others in the post-modern philosophy kind of thinking that says that the Bible we don't know if it's true or not because it's a translation, right? It's just a translation. So how can you know if authoritatively this is what God said? Because how can we really know that? It's just a translation. We maybe translated it wrongly. But here's what's interesting. Josh McDowell a couple of years ago at a pastor's conference let us in on a brand new discovery which they kind of this last year brought out into a public way so we can talk about it now. But they found some masks in Africa that as they begin to take the masks apart they found some of the oldest existing manuscripts of the Bible that were ever found that go back even further closer to the time. I think they can get within less than 100 years of when the texts were actually written, you know? And so which is pretty old. And you know what they found out as they're beginning to translate them? It's the exact same Bible that we have today. Isn't that exciting? So if you're questioning whether you can depend on the Word of God if you're questioning if that's even a question mark in your mind whether the Bible is true or not we're finding out through science and archeology that the Bible is completely true. It's completely authoritative. It's absolutely translated in the proper way that it is to be translated that you can build your life upon it and that there is nothing scientifically proven that says that it's faulty in any way. I think that's amazing that God has preserved His Word in that way. But there are false prophets that would say the Bible contains the Word of God but it's not the Word of God. We're not to listen to them. There are preachers that preach their dreams and their visions and not preach the Word of God. You know there are those that use the pulpit to preach politics and not the Word of God. Let me tell you something. Politicians will not save this world. Public policy will not make the world more righteous. It won't do it. There's only one person in this world that can save the world, that's Jesus Christ. There's only one thing that will make the world more righteous and that's the blood of Jesus Christ that washes away all sin. Amen? And if we want this world to change it's not who you vote for, it's who you live for. And we need to live for Jesus. I love that, to be a Jesus people community. God says don't listen to them because when you listen to them, when you let them into your life you'll feel compelled to give them your time, your attention, your friendship and eventually they'll target you and lead you astray and in the very least they'll leave you confused. Because you'll be trying to wonder is this really true what they're telling me or not? And I have to say, thank God that Calvary Chapel, Chino Valley has a pastor who loves you enough to teach you the Word of God, amen? Now one of the things that I've been talking about that is kind of crept into the church and we see it especially in some of the younger expressions of the church. And that is this belief or this teaching that we're to discover our passions and live for it. Have you heard that? You need to discover what you're passionate about and live for that. Can I just tell you that that is nowhere in the Bible? It is nowhere in Scripture to find what you're passionate about and live for it. Do you know what is in the Scripture? Absolute surrender and total obedience to Jesus Christ. That's what we're to do. We're to surrender our lives completely to Jesus and we're to be totally obedient to Him. That's what God calls us to do. But here's what I love about God. God knows you. God knows me. He knows the desires of our hearts and He loves to give us the desires of our hearts. So as we're totally committed to Him, as we're completely obedient to Him, what I find happening in my life is I find myself doing things that I love to do. And some things I didn't even know I love to do them. Because I don't know myself that well, but He does. And I'm doing these things that I love to do. And as I'm doing them, I'm seeing lives change around me and I'm going, God, this is amazing. I can't believe that I actually get to do this and I get paid to do it. This is amazing. And the Lord says, I know, but I didn't make you just to bake Krispy Kreme donuts. I made you for more than that. I said, but I'm okay with this. No, I'm just kidding. And I'm finding out that I'm living for what I'm passionate for because I'm passionate for Jesus. And that's what God wants for you. You know, He wants you to be completely surrendered to Him, totally obedient to Him. And as you're living for Him, you're going to find yourself living out the desires of your heart because He's made you. He knows you. He knows what you're all about. And some of you, God will lead you into different forms of business. Some of you, He'll lead you into management. Some into government. Some into sales. But wherever He leads you, let Him lead you by His Spirit and be totally obedient to it. So how do you thrive while you're living in Babylon? Well, the first thing is that you need to accept the reality of where you are. We need to accept the reality of where we are. We're not in heaven. You know, it's like they said to Toto, we're not in Kansas anymore, you know? We're not in heaven. We're not in our final destination place. We're in Babylon. And you know what? In Babylon, there is death. In Babylon, there is disease. There's mental illnesses. There's addictions in Babylon. There's all kinds of things that hurt people in Babylon. It's not heaven. You know, when I look at the Bible and I look in Genesis where we were actually created to live, I realized I was created to live in a tropical paradise. Probably Fiji. But I'm not in Fiji. You know, we're not in heaven. We're in Babylon. You know, I have a son who's mentally ill. He struggles. He has a dual diagnosis. His skits are effective. I didn't pick it. I didn't choose it. It wasn't what I wanted for my life when this little baby boy was born to us. And we love this baby boy all his whole life. But if I was to be honest, I mean, I wouldn't say, God, this is what I would have chosen for my life. But I realized that I'm not in heaven. I'm in Babylon. And so I'm not going to feel sorry for myself. I'm going to embrace the life that God has given me. And here's the thing that I realized. Here's the thing that I realized. God, in his infinite wisdom, looked at all the families of the earth. And he says, you know what? I need to entrust this little precious child to someone who's going to love them. I need someone that's going to look after him and care for him. I want someone that's going to raise him in my ways. I'm going to give him to Holland and Roxy. You might be in that position tonight. And I want to tell you something. God has given our son to us as a gift to us. And that's how we see it. And we've embraced him into our lives. This is what God has entrusted to us. The second thing you need to do is to let God have his way in the midst of your life. It does no good to hang your harp on a willow tree and sit around and weep. You know, it might be what you feel like doing. It might be a temporary reaction to a difficult situation. But it does no good to fight the circumstances you're in because in the case of Judah, they were experiencing the consequences of their own choices. But in the midst of those choices, they could surrender their lives to what God intended for them. They could give themselves completely over to him. And you know what? That's what we've done. You know, Lord, I didn't choose this, but I choose you and I'm going to follow you in the midst of this. And Lord, in the midst of all that I'm going through, what you tell me to do is to build houses and to live in them. You tell me to build a life, not to sit back and to just wallow in self-pity, but to move forward. You tell me to plant vineyards and to eat the food. You tell me to increase, to rule over this situation by increasing, you know, by having children and living life and marrying and all this. And you tell me, Lord, in the midst of all of this, to pray for peace everywhere I am, to bless the city, the place that I am, with the peace of God that passes all understanding. And then you tell me, don't listen to any other voice but mine. Because every other voice is going to lie to you, but mine. You see? And that's what God has for you and for me. God's intent wasn't to rescue them from their circumstances, but to deliver them through their circumstances, to teach them how to live while they were dealing with their consequences so that they would do more than just survive, they would thrive. Warren Wearsby says this. He says, one of the first steps in turning tragedy into triumph is to accept the situation courageously and to put ourselves in the hands of a loving God who makes no mistakes. You can't change Babylon, but you can change how you live and respond while you're living in Babylon by placing your life in God's hands. And even if your life falls apart, your life falls apart in God's hands. It's a win-win situation.